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This pop and modern music trivia quiz has 100 free questions with answers and spans the stars teenagers stream today and the ones who built the charts before them: Taylor Swift, Billie Eilish, Olivia Rodrigo, Harry Styles, Dua Lipa, BTS, Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan alongside Michael Jackson, Madonna, Whitney Houston, ABBA and the Spice Girls. It is written to work as music trivia for teens at a party or in a classroom, with plenty of easy questions on current hits, and it still has hard rounds on records, awards and music history for the grown-ups. Every answer has been checked against a reliable source and each question shows its citation once you have answered.
30 of 100 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In what year did MTV first go on the air?
1981
It launched at 12:01 a.m. on August 1, 1981, under Warner-Amex, and the first clip it aired was the Buggles' 'Video Killed the Radio Star'.
Q 02Which artist is often referred to as the 'King of Pop'?
Michael Jackson
Michael Jackson's publicists embraced 'King of Pop' around 1989, the year Elizabeth Taylor called him 'the true king of pop, rock and soul' at the Soul Train Music Awards.
Q 03Which pop star calls her fans 'Little Monsters' and is known to them as 'Mother Monster'?
Lady Gaga
Lady Gaga has 'Little Monsters' tattooed on her arm, and botanists in 2012 named the fern species Gaga monstraparva ('little monster') in honour of her fans.
Q 04Which pop artist released the album '1989', named after their birth year?
Taylor Swift
Taylor Swift, born in December 1989, released her fifth studio album 1989 in October 2014, marking her full pivot from country to pop.
Q 05Which pop artist co-founded the record label OVO Sound?
Drake
Drake co-founded the label OVO Sound in 2012 with producer Noah '40' Shebib and manager Oliver El-Khatib; its name comes from his October's Very Own brand.
Q 06Which country singer wrote and first recorded 'I Will Always Love You', Whitney Houston's 1992 hit?
Dolly Parton
Dolly Parton wrote it in 1973 as a farewell to her mentor Porter Wagoner when she left his show; Houston's version was recorded for The Bodyguard.
Q 07Which pop artist released the album '÷' (Divide) in 2017?
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran's ÷ came out on 3 March 2017 with 'Shape of You' and 'Castle on the Hill' as lead singles, and was the best-selling album in the world that year.
Q 08Who has been dubbed both the 'Queen of Latin Pop' and the 'Queen of Telenovelas'?
Thalía
Thalía earned the second crown through 1990s telenovelas such as Marimar and María la del Barrio, which aired in well over a hundred countries alongside her Latin pop hits.
Q 09Which pop artist is known for the song 'Baby One More Time'?
Britney Spears
Britney Spears's debut single '...Baby One More Time' (1998) topped the Billboard Hot 100 in January 1999, and Rolling Stone in 2020 named it the greatest debut single of all time.
Q 10Which act was the first to reach 20 number-one singles on the Billboard Hot 100?
The Beatles
The Beatles reached 20 Hot 100 number ones with 'The Long and Winding Road' in 1970; in one week of April 1964 they held all five top spots at once.
Q 11Which 1982 album became a global phenomenon and remains one of the best-selling records ever?
Thriller
Thriller, Michael Jackson's sixth studio album, surged after his televised moonwalk in May 1983 and the title-track video; Jackson won a record eight Grammys at the 1984 ceremony.
Q 12Which British girl group of five took 'Girl Power' mainstream in the mid-1990s with 'Wannabe'?
Spice Girls
Spice Girls' 1996 debut 'Wannabe' spent seven weeks at number one in the UK, and the group were in Japan when they heard it had reached the top.
Q 13Which female artist reached a record 35 Grammy wins at the February 2025 ceremony?
Beyoncé
Q 21Sabrina Carpenter's 2024 hit 'Espresso' was the lead single from which album, her sixth?
Short n' Sweet
Short n' Sweet's lead single reached number one in the UK and number three in the US, her first top-five hit there, and won Best Pop Solo Performance at the 2025 Grammys.
Q 22Who won Best New Artist at the 67th Grammy Awards in February 2025?
Chappell Roan
Chappell Roan, born Kayleigh Rose Amstutz, broke through with 'Good Luck, Babe!' after her 2023 debut album The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess became a slow-burning sleeper hit.
Q 23Which 2011 album won Album of the Year at the 2012 Grammys?
21
Beyoncé passed conductor Georg Solti's 31 in 2023 and reached 35 awards at the February 2025 ceremony, more than any artist, male or female.
Q 14Disco emerged in the early 1970s from the underground club scene of which US metropolis?
New York
New York's scene grew out of venues popular with Black, Latino and Italian-American crowds, especially in Brooklyn, with Philadelphia's soul scene a close second influence.
Q 15Which singer, dubbed the 'Queen of Pop', is known for reinventing her image since the early 1980s?
Madonna
Madonna, whose first single 'Everybody' came out in 1982, earned the 'Queen of Pop' tag by reinventing her look with each era, from the 1984 'Like a Virgin' bride to 1990's Blond Ambition Tour.
Q 16Which group launched its international career by winning Eurovision 1974 with 'Waterloo'?
ABBA
ABBA nearly entered 'Hasta Mañana' but chose 'Waterloo' because it featured Agnetha and Frida equally; at the 2005 'Congratulations' show it was voted the best song in Eurovision history.
Q 17Which 2019 hit ended 'Old Town Road's 19-week Hot 100 reign and won Record of the Year?
Bad Guy
'Bad Guy' replaced 'Old Town Road' in August 2019, making 17-year-old Billie Eilish the first artist born in the 2000s to top the Hot 100; her brother Finneas co-wrote and produced it.
Q 18Olivia Rodrigo became the youngest artist to debut at number one on the Hot 100 with which 2021 single?
Drivers License
'Drivers License' was her debut single, released when she was 17, and it stayed at number one for eight straight weeks.
Q 19Which 2022 album by a former One Direction member took Album of the Year at the 65th Grammy Awards?
Harry's House
Harry's House won Album of the Year in February 2023; its lead single 'As It Was' debuted at number one in both the UK and the US, Harry Styles's second solo chart-topper in each country.
Q 20What was BTS's first all-English song, the first Hot 100 number one by an all-South Korean act?
Dynamite
'Dynamite', released in August 2020, debuted atop the Hot 100 and earned BTS their first Grammy nomination, for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance.
21, named for Adele's age when she wrote it, won Album of the Year at the 2012 Grammys and sold more than 31 million copies, the biggest album of the 2010s.
Q 24Which singer headlined the Super Bowl LVII halftime show in 2023, confirming a pregnancy right after?
Rihanna
Rihanna's show at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona was her first live performance in years, and the baby was her second child.
Q 25Which 2024 Beyoncé album made her the first Black woman to top Billboard's Top Country Albums chart?
Cowboy Carter
Cowboy Carter went on to win Album of the Year, Best Country Album and Best Country Duo/Group Performance for 'II Most Wanted', her duet with Miley Cyrus, at the 2025 Grammys.
Q 26Taylor Swift's Eras Tour, 149 shows over 21 months, played its final night on December 8, 2024 in which city?
Vancouver
Vancouver closed a tour that began in Glendale, Arizona in March 2023 and drew roughly 10 million people.
Q 27Which actor played a satirical Uncle Sam during Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl LIX halftime show?
Samuel L. Jackson
Samuel L. Jackson narrated the February 2025 show in New Orleans as a satirical Uncle Sam; it averaged 133.5 million viewers, then a halftime record, and Serena Williams crip-walked during 'Not Like Us'.
Q 28Prince's 1984 soundtrack album Purple Rain won which Academy Award in 1985?
Best Original Song Score
Purple Rain took the Oscar for Best Original Song Score at the March 1985 ceremony, the last time that category was awarded; the album, credited to Prince and the Revolution, sold about 25 million copies.
Q 29Whitney Houston's 1991 national anthem opened Super Bowl XXV in which city?
Tampa
Super Bowl XXV was played at Tampa Stadium on 27 January 1991; Buffalo lost when Scott Norwood's last-second field goal sailed wide right, and Houston's anthem recording became a chart hit.
Q 30Michael Jackson first moonwalked on TV at a 1983 special for which label's 25th anniversary?
Motown
At Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever, taped in March 1983, Jackson mimed 'Billie Jean', the only non-Motown song on the show, while the single sat midway through seven weeks at number one.